The Meddlers
by Nade-Naberrie
Summary: Erik, Christine and Raoul made their choices on the night of Don Juan Triumphant, and are prepared to live with them. But beyond the walls of the opera house, how much of their life's trajectory is determined by choice, or by fate, or by the meddlesome nature of their family and friends?
1. The Unhappy Nursemaid

**A/N:** Well, I'm back. It's been a long time, friends. Have you missed me, good messieurs? I have written you a fanfic…

In all seriousness, it's lovely to be "home." I recently fell down a Phantom black hole in a big way, after all the 30th anniversary celebration videos started flooding my social media feed. I re-read both Leroux and Kay, and watched the 2004 movie, the 25th Anniversary DVD, and the Charles Dance version. Started reading recent fic on here, and was thrilled to see that this remains a vibrant, intelligent, incredibly talented community after so many years.

This story is a true Heinz 57 mix of versions, but I'd describe it as predominantly Kay/Leroux up until Christine's entrance, from which point it skews more ALW. (Really, guys, it's just an excuse for me to write Nadir and Madame Giry in cahoots.)

I'm currently in the market for a beta. Please PM me if you are interested or have recommendations! Edited to add: Barb's on it! Thanks Mominator124. :)

 **Disclaimer** : I am not the ghost of Gaston Leroux, nor am I Susan Kay (sadly), nor am I a representative of the Really Useful Group. I'm just borrowing their work and blending it like a Vitamix.

* * *

 _"The idea of strictly minding our own business is moldy rubbish. Who could be so selfish?"_ – Myrtle Barker

* * *

 _ **Nadir Khan**_

"Erik?" I called softly from the doorway to my study.

There was no response.

Wetting my lips, I tried again, a bit more forcefully. " _Erik?_ "

A muffled noise of discontent emitted from somewhere beneath the mound of blankets on the divan, and I released the breath I had unintentionally been holding. It had become a terrifying gamble, entering that room every morning. One of these times, I was certain I'd be forced to peel back the coverlet to reveal a true corpse.

Reassured, for the moment, that my sullen houseguest had survived yet another night, I finally dared to venture over the threshold. By force of habit, I went directly to the end table beside the divan to examine the contents of last night's supper tray. It appeared he did drink some tea, at least; I lifted the ceramic pot to test its weight, and found it half-empty. The fruit, cheese, and bread, on the other hand, were still untouched.

"This is quickly becoming ridiculous, Erik. You must eat _something_ ," I insisted. "It's been four days!"

He made no effort to sit up, or emerge from the protective cocoon he'd fashioned around himself. "How charming of you to keep count," came his muffled retort.

I scowled down at the mass of blankets heaped over his rail-thin frame. "I mean it. You can't carry on like this indefinitely."

"Certainly not," he replied, with the air of weary indulgence one normally reserves for a particularly dim-witted child. "No one lives _indefinitely_."

I tilted my head back, lifting my eyes heavenward in search of divine patience. With pursed lips, I drew in a deep breath through my nose and released it as a sigh. "If you don't like the food I have provided, I'd be happy to find a more agreeable alternative. I'm sending Darius to the market this afternoon. Is there anything in particular I should tell him to pick up for you?"

He paused to consider my offer before answering, "A bottle of laudanum, if he can spare a trip to the apothecary."

"Erik," I began, exasperation creeping in to my tone.

"I have a headache."

 _You are giving_ me _a headache,_ I wanted to snap at him. But even so far removed from my homeland, I could not shake the deeply ingrained notions of hospitality, which mandated that a guest's every comfort be provided for. There was nothing to do but acquiesce, and be happy he wasn't requesting anything stronger.

"Very well. Is there anything else?"

I had long ago given up the effort of trying to predict Erik's behavior, for he inevitably left me reeling with his ability to shift from one mood to another in rapid succession. I shouldn't have been surprised, therefore, when he abruptly pushed his blankets aside and sat up, reaching across the divan to take a cluster of red grapes from the tray.

"No," he answered, his voice unexpectedly gentle. "Thank you, but you really needn't go to the trouble. This is perfectly sufficient." He wouldn't meet my gaze, and with his slouching shoulders and what little of his expression I could see around his mask, he appeared almost… penitent. "I don't wish you to think me ungrateful, Dargoa," he continued quietly, as he plucked a grape from its stem and rolled it between his thumb and forefinger. "You have been a gracious host. I assure you, my indifference to food long predates my stay under this roof."

I shook my head at him, a placid smile playing at the corner of my mouth. "Well, I'd lend you some of my appetite, if I could. I'm getting fat in my old age." I patted my rounded gut for emphasis.

Erik glanced up at me, finally, his golden eyes glinting with amusement. "You aren't old," he insisted, very pointedly failing to address the other half of my sentence. I laughed, more than willing to bear the brunt of his mockery if it meant putting him in a better humor.

" _Eat_ , you insolent wretch," I scolded playfully as I turned and walked back out of the room. Feeling suddenly sentimental, I paused at the doorway, just long enough to quote his own words over my shoulder. "Your tiresome health has become very dear to me."

I can't be certain, but I thought I saw the glimmer of tears in his eyes as I closed the door to the study behind me.

I went straight away to find Darius, and sent him off to buy the damned laudanum.


	2. Exposé

**A/N:** Boy, you sure do know how to make a girl feel welcome. :) Thank you very much for the reviews! They are, as always, greatly appreciated. This chapter is a bit longer, and a bit heavier on background... laying out the chess pieces, as it were, trying to bring everyone up to speed via everyone's favorite ballet mistress. Enjoy!

* * *

 _ **Antoinette Giry**_

In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, I was wretched with grief. Propelled inexhaustibly by the force of my own guilt, I paced the creaking floorboards of our little flat until I drove my poor daughter to distraction; Meg began to assume menial household chores normally reserved for the maid – folding laundry, mending stockings, polishing shoes – anything to keep her hands moving and her mind occupied. Each day at noon, she forced me to sit down with her at the coffee table and peruse the classified ads for temporary employment postings, "just in case" the theater restoration took longer than expected. For her part, Meg blatantly ignored the headlines splashed in bold lettering across the front page of the newspaper, flipping past them as though her willful ignorance could somehow alter reality. I was just the opposite. I forced myself to read every poisonous word that dripped from those pages, slandering the child I loved like my own.

The press was having a veritable field day with the whole affair, each newspaper attempting to outsell the others with their outrageous claims of scandal and debauchery. Public opinion had turned swiftly against Christine, painting her, at best, as a harlot who sought to social climb by bedding the most eligible bachelor in town, and at worst, as an extortionist who had fabricated an elaborate story about an Opera Ghost in order to blackmail the managers into paying her a salary of twenty-thousand francs a month. The de Chagny family's refusal to comment only added fuel to the fire, embroiling them further in the scandal from which they were so desperate to recoil. Their pleas for privacy during this difficult time fell on deaf ears; suddenly the papers were not only implicating Raoul as a co-conspirator in Christine's "so-called kidnapping," but as a prime suspect in his brother's murder.

After three days of that madness, I'd had quite enough. I tossed the stack of newspapers into the fireplace, donned my coat and bonnet, took up my cane, and struck out into the wintry Parisian streets with a renewed sense of purpose.

There were only four people who knew for certain what had transpired in the cellars of the opera house on that godforsaken night – five, perhaps, but Philippe de Chagny's corpse lay on a coroner's slab, and dead men tell no tales. Erik, I believed, was lost forever; also likely dead, or at the very least long gone from Paris. In response to the relentless barrage of the press, Raoul had whisked his fiancée off to his family's sprawling country estate, where he and Christine could convalesce in peace. For the time being, they were refusing all visitors.

That left only the Persian – who, by my estimation, would have the most objective account of the night's events anyway, as he was the only witness among them who was a non-party to the whole affair. Come hell or high water, I had decided to track him down and ascertain the truth of the matter. Only then, I reasoned, could I begin to reconcile myself to the role I had to play in the tragedy, make amends, and somehow attempt to sweep up the pieces of our broken lives and start anew.

Of course, this was all well and good in theory. In reality, the task at hand proved far more formidable than I ever would have imagined.

I will grant the Persian this much: he was exceedingly difficult to locate.

Everyone knew _of_ him, of course. He had lingered for years around the periphery of the opera house, tucked inconspicuously into little-used corridors and shadowed corners. On the handful of occasions that I had reason to interact with him, I found him to possess a most agreeable disposition; even when I caught him off-guard, rounding a corner too quickly, he was soft-spoken and perfectly genteel. He mostly kept to himself, forever scribbling in a little black notebook. I suppose I had always assumed that he was employed, in some manner or another, by the opera house. Given the ragtag ensemble that made up our company and crew, the Persian's presence was easily overlooked as yet another of the _Garnier_ 's trademark little peculiarities. Oddly enough, though, a cursory glance at the most recent payroll, followed by a much more extensive search through seven years' worth of tax records, thoroughly dispelled that long-held notion. Apparently, the Persian had never been employed by the opera house in any capacity – at least, not on any public record.

My curiosity surrounding this mysterious figure only intensified when I began to inquire about him to others who had worked alongside me over the years. For a man who had been a near-constant presence in the opera house for the better part of a decade, I was astonished to learn just how little any of us knew about him. I picked the brains of everyone from the stagehands to the wig master to the second cellist, but in the end, I'd scrounged up disconcertingly few details for my efforts. To my dismay, it appeared none of us had ever even bothered to learn the gentleman's name.

More than a week passed before I managed to track down a retired box-keeper who had the vague notion that he had once overheard our former manager refer to the Persian as "Monsieur Khan." It was secondhand information, hearsay at best, and coming from an elderly fellow who struggled to recall what he had eaten for breakfast that very morning. Still, it was the only lead I had after weeks of fruitless searching, so I decided to pursue it as far as it would take me.

To my pleasant surprise, I soon discovered that even with the steady influx of Persian students to the esteemed universities of Paris, there were only so many men by the name of Khan in the city. I made my inquiries as discreetly as possible, and then began the arduous task of narrowing my list of twenty-eight potential M. Khans to the one I was searching for. It took several days of modest detective work before I arrived on the fourth floor of a Lutetian limestone complex on the Rue di Rivoli, staring at the number 415 inscribed on the door of a flat belonging to one _Nadir Khan_.

I took the time to smooth my hair and brush the beads of melted snow from my collar before rapping my cane on the door. After eleven failed attempts to locate the correct Monsieur Khan thus far, the knotted feeling in my gut had eased considerably; there was no longer any trepidation in knocking on a stranger's door, for a large part of me had already resigned itself to the fact that this enigmatic gentleman would forever remain a mystery to me.

One can only begin to imagine my surprise when the door opened to reveal none other than the Persian himself! The look of incredulity that seized his aging features must have mirrored my own exactly. For a brief moment the two of us stood in mutually stunned silence, each regarding the other as if we'd been met with a ghost.

I was the first to recover; I had, after all, been the one to seek him out. Schooling my features as best I could, I dipped my chin politely. "Monsieur Khan, I believe?"

Still agape, the Persian stammered, "Madame Giry! But how did you—?" He took half a step forward, looking past my shoulder into the hallway behind me. His jade eyes were suddenly wary. "Have you brought the gendarmes?"

I blinked, genuinely taken aback. "No. Why would I?"

His gaze continued to dart rapidly from my face to the hallway behind me, as though he didn't quite believe me. His knuckles were white on the door frame. "Were you followed?"

My brow furrowed. This was not at all the reception I had expected from a man who ordinarily went out of his way to be courteous. "Monsieur Khan, I don't—"

He flicked a hand dismissively, as if suddenly remembering himself. "No, never mind, it's quite all right. You certainly wouldn't know if they… but please, do come inside. Er, no, I'm terribly sorry, no, stay there. Stay right there. I'll just – let me fetch my coat, and I'll be with you directly… just, ah, just one moment…"

I took a slow step backward, watching him with a mixture of incredulity and concern. "Monsieur Khan, are you quite well?"

"Oh, yes!" he insisted, his voice an octave too high. He gave a nervous little laugh. "Yes, quite well, thank you. You simply caught me by surprise, that's all. A most welcome surprise, of course! My sincere apologies for the abhorrent way I greeted you, Madame. I haven't been sleeping well these last few nights. I fear I'm not myself." His hands were shaking as he pulled a long coat and astrakhan cap down from a wrought iron coat rack just inside the door. Admittedly, my interactions with him over the years had been limited, at best, but there was something distinctively _off_ about the way he was behaving.

It was almost as if…

Sudden realization struck me like a bolt of lightning, and the Persian turned back just in time to see it dawn across my face. Any confirmation I needed was written plainly in his expressive green eyes.

"He's here." It was a statement, not a question.

He deflated slightly. "Yes."

I was numb for a moment, unsure of how to process the revelation. My mouth was suddenly dry, and I struggled to form words. "I swear to you, I didn't know."

"I believe you," he assured me. He had finished donning his coat and cap. Taking his keys down from a hook on the wall, he stepped out into the hallway beside me and locked the door behind him. "Please," he said, gesturing toward the stairwell at the end of the hall. "Walk with me."


	3. The Eye of the Beholder

**A/N:** Sorry for the delay, friends. This chapter was fully intent upon killing me. I don't even want to count the number of re-writes, but it's well over a dozen. Sheesh. Get your life together, Danielle!

Infinite thanks to Flora Grey for hashing over character motives with me for literally hours on end, and to HC247 for helping me agonize over dialogue, syntax and word choice for hours on end… are you getting that my poor betas have to listen to me spoon feed them my insecurities for hours on end? They're saints. Appreciate them, please! I certainly do.

* * *

 _ **Nadir**_

By the time I recovered from the shock of finding Madame Giry on my doorstep, I'd made a damned fool of myself. Apparently, I'd retained all of the paranoia of my former profession and none of the finesse. After wrongly accusing her of conspiring in a police raid, it was all I could do to stand there stammering like a tongue-tied buffoon. It would have been mortifying, were there room in my addled brain for anything beyond the deafening instinct to get her as far away from Erik as possible.

In effect, I panicked.

I led her down the three flights of stairs with my heart pounding in my chest, painfully aware of each creaking floorboard. It was irrational, of course; I knew Erik wouldn't give chase. Not that he didn't enjoy the occasional game of cat-and-mouse when the inspiration struck him, but I had the feeling this turn of events would put him in far too foul a mood for games.

Madame Giry was… not on his list of favorite people at the moment.

On the disastrous night of _Don Juan Triumphant_ , I had followed Erik down into the cellars, intent upon reasoning with him myself (before I inadvertently acquired the "assistance" of the Vicomte, whose presence in the hostage negotiations only served to make matters worse for everyone). In the meantime, Madame Giry had gone directly to the chief of police and offered to escort the gendarmes to the house on the lake. I believe our intentions at the outset were very much the same; it was merely the method that varied.

In her defense, she could not possibly have known the devastation that would ensue from her particular brand of meddling.

After the gendarmes had searched the premises, the Sûreté had been called in to collect anything they deemed of interest to the kidnapping case for evidence. Once they'd completed their work, they had given the managers of the opera house jurisdiction over all the rest to do with as they pleased. Naturally, Messieurs Andre and Firmin had leapt at the opportunity to recover any of their losses from that catastrophic night. When I sent Darius back to the fifth cellar a few days later to retrieve some of Erik's personal effects, my manservant had found the place thoroughly gutted.

Everything was gone. The furniture that had once belonged to Erik's mother, programs and mementos from every one of Christine's performances, his eclectic collection of art, books, and musical instruments from all over the world… His compositions, blueprints, paintings, designs, inventions far beyond the scope of our time – all the products of Erik's unique and unrepeatable genius, lost in one fell swoop.

He'd been unnaturally still when I told him, his golden eyes staring vacantly ahead. After a long moment he'd gone into the study and shut the door, sinking into a depression from which he had yet to surface.

Suffice to say I did not see forgiveness on the horizon for Madame Giry at any point in the imminent future.

And now I had absconded with her.

Thankfully, I did have the foresight to think of Darius before we departed the building. I left instructions for him with the doorman to make himself scarce once he returned with Erik's laudanum. I would not allow him to step unwittingly into the lion's den before I had a chance to return and at least _attempt_ to explain myself to our notoriously volatile houseguest.

A shudder worked its way up my spine at the thought, and Madame Giry was too shrewd of a woman to miss it. She leveled me with a knowing stare as I returned to her side and offered her my arm. Though she might have made any number of smart remarks in that moment, she merely slid her gloved hand through the crook of my elbow in silence. Perhaps she understood more than I gave her credit for. After all, she had been dealing with _Him_ for years. If anyone could begin to appreciate the moral, emotional, and psychological conundrum of maintaining any semblance of a friendship with Erik, perhaps she could.

 _At least that would make one of us_ , I thought wearily as I escorted her through the front door and out into the swirling snow.

My building stood on the north side of the Rue di Rivoli, directly opposite the Tuileries. Even on a bitterly cold February morning such as this, all of the garden's main thoroughfares were cluttered with tourists and local commuters passing through on their way to work. Still, I knew a number of quiet alcoves where one could escape to be alone – or, in our case, to speak in confidence.

I led Madame Giry at a clipped pace across the bustling street and the Terrasse des Feuillants, headed straight for the heart of the garden. About a quarter of the way down the _allée_ we took a sharp right behind a row of hedges, ducking out of the line of sight of my flat's windows. From there, we slowed to a more leisurely pace, following a narrow walking path through a grove of gnarled old elm trees. An assortment of benches and chairs were scattered throughout the arbor, most of them covered with snow and wet brown leaves. In spring, the gathering spot would come alive again, animated with conversation and laughter and music, but for the time being it was utterly abandoned, and perfectly suited to our purpose.

I brushed the sodden debris from one of the benches with the sleeve of my coat and gestured for Madame Giry to sit. The ballet mistress hesitated, casting an anxious glance behind us.

"You're, em… you're quite certain he won't follow us here?"

I let out a shaky, helpless little laugh. "No. I've learned never to deal in certainties, where Erik is involved." I gave her a half-hearted smile and motioned once again for her to take a seat. "But he is a creature of habit, and thus far he hasn't set a foot outside my flat since the, uh…" I made a vague circling gesture.

Madame Giry nodded. "Since that night," she supplied, lowering herself stiffly onto the bench.

I hummed in agreement as I took a seat beside her. A few beats of tense silence ticked by before I managed to add, with a bit more optimism, "In any case, he's generally not one for venturing out in public, if he can help it. Especially not in broad daylight."

"That's true," she conceded, though she didn't sound the least bit reassured. After a pause, she squared her shoulders and raised her chin resolutely. "Well, I suppose this is as good a place as any, then." I regarded her curiously as she pivoted in her seat to face me. "I've come for the truth, Monsieur Khan, and I don't intend to leave this bench until I've heard it."

I couldn't help but smile at the naïve simplicity of the request. "And what truth would that be, Madame Giry?"

"About what happened that night. I want you to tell me everything you saw, everything you heard, every last sordid detail. The _truth_ —"

"—is very much in the eye of the beholder," I deflected.

Her expression hardened. "Spare me the elusive platitudes. I am too old and too cynical for them."

"Forgive me." I raised a palm in deference. "I only meant—"

"That if I were to ask Christine or Monsieur le Vicomte the same question, I would receive very different answers?" She made an impatient gesture. "I'm well aware that there will be… _inconsistencies_ among each retelling. But any modicum of the truth is better than reading another of those horror stories concocted by the press." She stared me down unflinchingly for a long moment before something shifted in her eyes, offering the briefest glimpse of the pain harbored beneath. Her tone thawed by a few degrees as she asked again, "Please, Monsieur. Tell me what you know."

And so, against my better judgment, I did.

* * *

" _ **That Night"**_

 **Saturday, February 11th, 1882**

We remained in the drawing room for quite some time, silent but for Erik's breathless, ragged sobs. He stood facing away from me, one arm braced against the mantle. The fire had long since dwindled to embers, bathing the room in a dim, flickering orange glow. I was sorely tempted to move nearer to its inviting heat; my shirt, vest and cravat were soaked through with perspiration and sewer-grime, the skin beneath puckered with gooseflesh. Still, I maintained my position just inside the door.

Of course, part of me wanted very much to go to him, to offer some futile attempt at consolation. There was no longer any doubt in my mind that he loved that girl – loved her more than anything in his entire wretched life. He'd come completely unhinged at the prospect of losing her, threatening to bring all of Paris crashing down with him in the throes of his grief. It had defied every last instinct he possessed to let her go.

I was deeply, profoundly proud of him. But at the same time, I could not simply dismiss the heinous acts of violence that had scorched his path to redemption.

The tenets of my faith compelled me toward mercy, and I was certain that with time and prayer, Allah would guide me to a state of forgiveness. But as I stood there in that drawing room, shuddering and feverish and feeling every one of my forty-eight years in my bones, I permitted myself a moment of well-deserved bitterness.

It might have been hours or minutes before Erik finally spoke; I found my sense of time unnervingly disoriented underground.

"Is she gone?" he rasped, his voice shredded nearly beyond recognition.

I watched him guardedly, trying to ascertain whether or not the question was meant to be rhetorical. We had left Mlle. Daaé and the Vicomte on the lakeshore, with Erik's firm instruction to take the boat to the Rue Scribe corridor. If the young lovers had any sense at all, they were halfway across Paris by now.

"I can only imagine so," I replied wearily.

"I did not question the capacity of your _imagination_ ," Erik growled, sounding much more like himself. He gestured angrily at the door behind me. "Look with your eyes, Daroga! I need to be certain."

Something about the way he said the last part raised an alarm bell in my head. Regardless, obliging him currently seemed the wisest course of action. If I had learned anything during my tenure as chief of police, it was that a man with nothing left to lose was a dangerous one. Moving slowly, I backed up to the door and turned the knob, one eye still trained on Erik. I opened it a crack, and took a quick look outside. Once I was satisfied that everything appeared to be in order, I pushed the door wide open for his inspection.

"They took the boat, just as you instructed," I told him. Realizing that perhaps he needed to hear the words explicitly, I added, "She's gone, Erik."

He remained stone-still, his gaze fixed on the dying fire. The ensuing silence stretched on for so long that I began to wonder whether or not he'd heard me. At long last, he gave a faint nod of acknowledgement. "Good," he said in a strained whisper. "Good, that's…"

Absently, his fingertips drifted up to his lips. The moment they touched, he stiffened, blinking away the haze of his reverie as though surfacing from a dream. Without warning, he lurched forward unsteadily and began to upend the contents of the room. It was all I could do to stay out of his way as he staggered from one spot to the next, shuffling through piles of sheet music, opening and closing various cabinets and drawers. Thankfully, he found what he was searching for in fairly short order: he snatched a sleek black wig from a plaster bust on the bookshelf, and procured a spare porcelain mask from one of the drawers of his escritoire. He smoothed both items into place in one practiced movement, and all of the tension in his frame collapsed on the tremulous exhale of a sigh.

For a while he stood with his back to me, hunched over and breathing heavily. Evidently I must have made some infinitesimal movement or sound, for he wheeled about to face me abruptly, as though he had only just remembered that I was in the room. His surprise warped quickly into disdain as he swept a critical eye over my haggard appearance.

"Good God, you look a fright," he remarked, with the typical, unapologetic candor he seemed to reserve just for me. Motioning in the direction of the adjoining hallway, he instructed, "Go and change before you catch a chill. There are clean towels in the Louis-Philippe room. Take whatever apparel you require from my wardrobe." Turning away again, he began to rummage through the volumes on the nearest bookshelf. "I didn't see Darius with you tonight, so I presume you'll need cab fare for the ride home."

Without bothering to wait for a response, he plucked a worn red leather-bound copy of _Othello_ from the shelf, flipped it open to a dog-eared page, and withdrew an envelope filled with thousand-franc notes. When he extended it to me, I turned my head away with a noise of disgust. I knew precisely how he had amassed that tidy fortune, and I had no interest in profiting from extortion.

"Take it," he insisted.

I took a firm step back, shaking my head irritably. "I don't want your money, Erik."

He considered me for a moment before giving a sharp sigh. "Ever the fragile conscience," he muttered, tossing the envelope onto the nearest end table. "Suit yourself. The gendarmes will make good use of it if you won't."

"What do you mean?" I asked, frowning.

He flicked his hand in the direction of the door, as though I had missed something painfully obvious. I listened hard for a moment, but heard nothing but the distant lapping of waves against stone.

But, then… perhaps _lapping_ wasn't quite right. The longer I listened, the more it became apparent that the sound was too erratic for the natural movement of water.

Sensing that I had begun to catch on, Erik explained, "It seems the venerable Madame Giry has taken it upon herself to lead the official rescue effort. She is accompanied by twenty armed policemen, at least."

As if to punctuate his words, the electric bell suddenly gave a jarring trill. I shuddered at the sound, another wave of goosebumps skittering down my arms.

For a few breathless seconds there was nothing but silence.

Then, somewhere out on the lake, a man's voice screamed.

A cacophony of frantic sounds followed: the shouting of many voices all at once, violent splashing, someone blowing a whistle. I felt all the blood drain from my face as I listened. Time felt as though it had slowed to a crawl, the world itself frozen on its axis.

"My God, Erik," I breathed. "What have you done?"

"Hmm?" he hummed distractedly. He was stretching up over his head, running a hand along the top of the bookshelf. He shot me a quick, impatient look over his shoulder before returning to his search. "Ah. It would appear they've stumbled upon the Comte de Chagny's remains."

I didn't even have the wherewithal to cry out in horror. I'd heard the bell when the Vicomte and I were in the torture chamber, but hadn't been of a mind to truly process what that meant for the poor soul on the other end. Oblivious to my dismay, Erik continued, "I should think that would delay their progress by a few minutes. If you hurry, you should still have time to change before you go."

Though he spoke with perfect indifference, I'd known him long enough to recognize the undercurrent of urgency to his tone. He was trying entirely too hard to be rid of me. Whatever fresh horror he was concocting, he didn't want me to linger long enough to see it.

"You honestly expect me to believe you're going to sit back and let them come?" I challenged angrily, placing my hands on my hips. "What sort of imbecile do you take me for?"

I watched as he dropped back onto the balls of his feet, dragging a small, dusty wooden box down from the top of the bookcase. He made no effort to answer me. "Erik…" I said in a warning tone. Still no response. I stepped into his path as he cut back across the room, but he wove fluidly around me, refusing eye contact. He went over to sit at his escritoire, placing the little box in front of him. Undeterred, I followed him, leaning over his desk with my palms laid flat across the polished wood. " _Baseh digeh!_ " I hissed, lapsing into Persian. _"_ Look at me! Whatever it is you're planning—"

"I haven't the faintest notion what you are insinuating," he said flatly.

"I think you do."

When his eyes lifted to meet mine, they were completely devoid of emotion. "I believe the chill has caused you to take leave of your senses, Daroga," he said quietly. "Perhaps it would be better if you went home straight away."

"And then what? Hm? What will you do?"

In response, he unlatched the rusted clasps on the box in front of him, opening it to reveal a metal syringe and several vials of morphine.

Scowling, I stepped back and folded my arms across my chest. "You told me you'd given it up," I said accusingly.

He shrugged. "I did."

The unspoken subtext trailed off into silence: He'd given up the morphine for Christine's sake. And now Christine was gone.

I watched, conflicted, as he drew up several milliliters of the clear liquid into the syringe. In his current state, I had to concede that perhaps it wasn't the worst idea; I might be better able to reason with him once he was sedated. Still, I turned away when he began to flick at the veins in his right arm, refusing to sanction the vice any more than I dared try and stop him.

"Go home, Daroga," Erik repeated behind me, his voice now tinged with unmistakable sorrow. "There's no need for you to stay for this."

I barely heard him. My attention was drawn back across the lake, where the frantic shouting had finally given way to law and order. A single man was barking out commands, and several more answered militantly. Though I couldn't make out the individual words, the intent behind them was clear: they had recovered from the shock of discovering a bloated corpse, and were proceeding with their mission as planned.

As I listened, fear began to gather like a knot in my throat. Allah in Heaven, they had no idea… _no idea_ what sort of danger they were walking into! It didn't matter whether there were twenty guards or two hundred descending upon these cellars; in a labyrinth of his own creation, armed with his own weapons, illusions, secret passages, and trap-doors, Erik was utterly invincible. With morphine coursing through his veins, there would be no inhibition left to restrain his vilest tendencies; the monster in him would be free to rain unholy terror down upon the intruders who dared to venture into his lair. Philippe de Chagny was only the beginning. I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that if I didn't act quickly, there would be twenty fresh corpses rotting in this cellar by daybreak.

I rounded on Erik with renewed fervor, my fists balled at my sides. I had made a desperate bid to save his soul once before. _Inshallah_ , I could do it again tonight.

"Listen to me. It's not too late," I said emphatically. "There is still time to put to right all the harm you've caused these last few months."

With a great sigh, he set the morphine syringe down on the desk in front of him. "You have a wearisome inability to accept defeat, old friend."

"And you'd do well to remember it!" I countered, eyes flashing. "I have a vested interest in the preservation of your _humanity_ , Erik. Need I remind you that I spent fiveyears in a Mazandaran prison to ensure that nights like this should never come to pass?" I couldn't be certain, but I thought I saw him wince behind the mask. Encouraged by even that small display of conscience, I pressed on doggedly, "If I did not make myself abundantly clear at the time, I did not secure your freedom in Persia only for you to become a butcher here in Paris! Now, what's done is done, so I don't suppose there's any sense in lecturing you about Miss Daaé, or the chandelier, o-or the _Comte_ , for God's sake. But is it truly too much to ask you to consider, just _once_ , taking responsibility for your actions?"

Erik had been staring at me with a shuttered expression until I mentioned the girl; now his eyes were alight and crackling like stirred embers. "I presume you are going to arrive at a point, Daroga," he growled. "Do it quickly."

"The point is…" I took a deep breath, dredging up the last of my courage. "The point is, I think the time has come for you to hand yourself over to the police." I gave a sad, helpless little shrug, then let my arms fall limp at my sides. "It's the right thing to do, Erik."

I expected him to erupt in a bark of laughter, to respond with some dismissive comment or scathing witticism.

But Erik wasn't laughing.

"You're right, of course," he said in a voice of eerie calm. I froze on instinct as he rose from the desk chair, unfurling to his full height with all the taut, coiled power of a cobra poised to strike. His eyes smoldered like molten gold in the firelight, and I knew, then and there, that I had made a grave mistake.

"When a feral animal prowls too close to polite society, what else could you be expected to do?" He began to pace slowly in front of the fireplace, both hands clasped at the small of his back. "Kill it outright? No, you've never had the stomach for murder. But a cage, Nadir, a _cage_ … that's a much more palatable solution, isn't it?"

I raked a hand through my thinning hair, rolling my eyes shut. "If you would leave off with the theatrics for half a minute and just _listen_ to what I am trying to—"

"Oh, no!" he interrupted. "No, I understand you quite plainly, Daroga. Naturally, I'd be more than happy to oblige your delicate constitution, if not for one trifling problem…" At last, he ceased his pacing and turned to face me head-on. "You see, I promised myself many years ago that I would never see the inside of a cage again." His upper lip curled back in a sneer. "And I do so hate to break my promises."

Emboldened far more than any sane man should have been, I demanded, "And what about the promise you made to me? You swore that there would be no more senseless killing!"

Unfurling his long fingers toward the ceiling, he noted dryly, "I'm afraid it's a bit late for that."

"So that's it, then?" I pressed him unrelentingly. "You unleashed a chandelier on a room full of innocent bystanders, so now you imagine it makes no difference whether or not you add another twenty officers to the death toll?"

"No," he said sharply, turning to face the fireplace again. "I don't believe that will be necessary."

It took me a moment to realize that he had, in fact, agreed with me; I was already preparing to launch into my next argument.

"What?"

"There is, of course, the more obvious compromise." He slid a hand along the underside of the mantle until his finger caught on some hidden spring in the wood. When he pressed it, a panel popped open to the right of the fireplace. He reached in to withdraw something, then slowly turned to face me.

A gleaming silver revolver rested in his hand.

I forced air steadily in and out of my lungs, refusing to show any reaction whatsoever. _He's trying to prove a point,_ I told myself. _You've hurt him, and he needs to reassert his power. That's all this is._

"You are a member of the police force, are you not?" he said, extending the revolver to me with calm deliberation.

"Not for a very long time," I answered hoarsely.

"A technicality I am willing to overlook." Erik took a step forward and encircled my hand with his own, pressing the revolver firmly into my sweating palm. When I tried to pull away, he reached out to grip my opposite shoulder. "You named yourself my keeper, that last night in Persia. 'Wherever you go and whatever you do in the future, you may consider yourself answerable to me.' Those were your exact words, were they not?" I stared at the lapels of his jacket, unable to look him in the eye, unwilling to answer him. Gripping my shoulder all the harder, he persisted, "Tonight I am holding you accountable to that promise, as I expect you to hold me accountable to mine."

 _My God,_ I thought. _My God, I believe he actually means for me to go through with this._

The first sparks of panic began to blitz through my chest, and I did my best to tamp them down before they could ignite into a blaze. One of us needed to remain rational, and it certainly wasn't going to be Erik.

"You are twisting my words," I said severely, still scrambling to find my mental footing amongst the brambles he'd laid all around me.

"Am I?" he sneered. He released his grasp on the revolver so that I had no choice but to take it. "Which part, exactly? Your request for police involvement, or for personal accountability?"

I drew in a breath to speak, but could think of no counter-argument. He'd backed me into a corner with my own line of logic. I made a gesture of angry despair, which Erik immediately mistook for assent.

"Come," he said brusquely. "I think it would be best if we conclude our business outside."

Still struggling to piece together a coherent rebuttal, I followed him down the stone steps to the dock where we had left the Vicomte and Christine. Her wedding veil drifted, ghostlike, in the shallows, and Erik bent with great reverence to retrieve it. He stood for a moment at the edge of the water, stroking this thumb over the white rosebuds of the crownpiece.

"Make certain she knows that I am gone," he said quietly, without looking up. "I don't wish her to watch over her shoulder for the rest of her life, imagining a mask in every shadow."

I shook my head at him sadly. "You truly think this is what Christine would want?"

He didn't have a chance to answer me; he looked up sharply from the veil, and I followed his gaze across the cavern, where a speck of yellow light flickered along the old Commune passage.

When the officers' voices called out this time, I could make out each word distinctly:

"I see a light ahead, sir!"

"Step lively, men! Arms at the ready!"

The gentle sloshing of water drew my attention back to Erik, who was repositioning himself squarely in front of me.

"That's enough, Erik," I told him, my voice wavering. "You made your point."

"And you made yours." With a clenched jaw, he pointed out across the lake. "What do you think will happen if I surrender myself? Hm? Do you imagine they'll give me a slap on the wrist? A firm warning? I am guilty of at least four capital offenses, Daroga. There is only one way this night is going to end." He took a menacing step toward me, his eyes boring into mine. "Either way, I'll not let them take me alive. End it yourself, or hand me the gun, and I'll force them to do it for you."

"Look, sir! Straight ahead!" a young man's voice echoed across the water. Erik and I both turned in unison to its source. At the far end of the cavern, the light from a dozen lanterns now bobbed just above the surface of the lake.

"You there!" cried the voice of an older gentleman. "Drop your weapon!"

Erik turned back to me sharply. "Finish it, Daroga!" he commanded.

My heart rate escalated to a frantic crescendo, hammering against my ribs so violently that it felt as if it would burst through my chest.

"Drop your weapon, monsieur!" the officer demanded again. "This is your final warning!"

Snarling, Erik took another step forward, grasping the barrel of the revolver and pointing it to his chest. His eyes flashed furiously. "Do it, Nadir!" he growled. " _Do it now!"_

The deafening crack of gunfire echoed throughout the cavern.

For a single pulseless moment, I was terrified that he had somehow convinced me to shoot. I looked down through swimming vision, and nearly collapsed with relief to find the revolver still fully loaded in my trembling hands. Whichever of the gendarmes had fired, their bullet had missed by a long shot, disappearing harmlessly beneath the lake's surface.

Still, the shock of it proved to be exactly what I needed to return abruptly to my senses.

" _Khodā margam bede!"_ I hissed in Persian. Swinging wide, I hurled the revolver into the lake. "Of all the idiotic plans, Erik!"

Another shot rang out across the cavern, and both Erik and I ducked instinctively this time. The bullet lodged into the rock face behind us, too close for comfort. When we righted ourselves again, Erik opened his mouth to speak, but I cut him off furiously, still ranting in my native Persian.

"I don't want you to die. Is that what you want to hear? By Allah, I swear to you, I don't want you to die!" I gripped him by the shoulders, hot tears of desperation springing to my eyes. "You are my friend, Erik. My _only_ friend left in this world. Come with me, and I will help you in any way I can. But if you elect to stay here, you do it alone. I will not stand here and watch you die."

Without waiting for his answer, I released him with a shove and stormed out into the frigid, waist-deep water, headed away from the approaching police and out toward the Rue Scribe corridor.

Despite myself, I heaved a sob of relief when I heard him wade out into the lake behind me.

* * *

 **A/N** :

Rough translations, for the curious:

 _Baseh digeh:_ That's enough!

 _Khodā margam bede:_ God, take me now

Poor Nadir. Such a good guy. Such good intentions. So adept at putting his foot in his mouth. Haha.

As a fanfic writer, I subsist on coffee and reviews. If you'd be so kind as to feed one of those habits, I'd be much obliged. ;)


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